- How are you doing, you wonderful nerds?
For years now, many of you have been asking that I cover the
story of how the Adventures of Superman radio
show battled the KKK.
The real, actual KKK.
I figured it was a story people have heard to
death by now,
but there are plenty of false details going
around and dang it, I think we could use
a little story of triumph over hate and bigotry.
So y'know what?
Let's talk about the time when Superman launched
an operation to bring down the Ku Klux Klan!
This amazingly true tale involves a ragtag team
of journalists, psychologists, and spies
infiltrating the KKK, learning their secrets,
and broadcasting them to millions of homes across America.
Hmm, so since I'm gonna be talking about
a radio program today, we probably won't have too many
image or video clips to cut to,
so I guess we can try to keep it
exciting with a change of scenery and way
more Hamilton references than normal.
Bare with me.
As I'm sure you know,
Superman made his big debut in Action Comics #1 from 1938.
In just two short years,
Superman became an unparalleled success.
The Man of Steel's comic stories were selling
2.5 million copies per month,
his likeness was placed on any and all
merchandise the company could think of,
and he was floated in balloon form during a
Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.
That story we already did do a video on.
With Superman skyrocketing into his role as a
national icon,
one man was at the center of his marketing success:
Bob Maxwell,
head of the Superman Inc. subsidiary
of National Allied Publications.
But the he wasn't quite satisfied with Superman's
success just yet.
Maxwell envisioned a children's radio program
featuring the Man of Tomorrow entitled:
The Adventures of Superman.
With Kellogg's Pep as their sponsor and the
legendary Bud Collyer playing the role of Clark Kent
and the Kryptonian hero,
the Superman radio show premiered its first
episode on February 12, 1940 with that familiar intro.
- [Announcer] Faster than a speeding bullet!
More powerful than a locomotive.
Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound!
Look, up the in sky.
It's bird, it's a plane!
It's Superman!
- It wasn't long before The Adventures of Superman
garnered over 4 million listeners.
Bob Maxwell as the the producer of the show knew
how to tell stories that could captivate audiences.
Behind the scenes,
he demanded perfection from his team.
Stories would have to be exciting and action-packed
with tense cliffhangers that would keep
listeners coming back for more.
He needed the actors and sound designers to
deliver the highest quality performances.
He pushed for nearly endless script rewrites
until the story was able to hit the perfect beats.
Behind the scenes,
the radio program was teaming with remarkable
talent in every aspect of production.
The show's influence can still be seen in
Superman's lore today as it introduced core
concepts like the name of the newspaper
Clark and Lois work at, The Daily Planet,
along with its editor Perry White.
It also introduced the character of Jimmy Olsen,
kind of.
We'll be making a tie-in video for that later.
But probably most importantly,
The Adventures of Superman introduced the world
to his glowing green weakness,
Kryptonite.
And if you're not tired of me pointing out
previous videos I've made just yet,
It's gonna be on that one too.
After years of Superman fighting monsters,
gangsters, and, of course,
classic World War II villains like nazis and
German scientists,
the show encountered a pair of problems.
Firstly, audiences were losing interest in
the Man of Steel facing off against foreign threats now that
the war started to become less relevant.
Secondly, comic books, superheroes,
and kid's radio were under fire by critical
psychologists who believed that these stories
were adversely affecting the minds of children.
While the villains and circumstances of the
stories might change,
the solution was always the same: violence.
Superman would punch his way out of every problem,
teaching kids that violence is always the answer.
The team behind The Adventures of Superman had to
address these two issues.
They needed a new villain who in their defeat
could teach the children listeners important and
applicable values.
And serendipitously,
a clan of real-life villains had stepped
into the spotlight once again.
The first incarnation of the Ku Klux Klan had
died out around the 1870s.
While they undoubtedly committed thousands of
horrendously violent acts upon black people and
those who didn't entirely hate black people,
there was a portion of America who for whatever
reason saw the KKK as champions of the oppressed white race.
In 1905, a novel titled
The Clansmen: A Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan
would inspire the 1915 propaganda film
"The Birth of a Nation."
These stories not only sparked a revival of the Klan,
but also introduced and standardized elements of
the KKK like their white costumes and the act
of burning crosses.
Later that year on top of Georgia's Stone Mountain,
a giant burning cross would signal the Klan's reformation.
They would attempt this same stunt decades later
as their membership numbers started to dwindle.
Apparently, some news outlets would report on this event
using words like eerie, mysterious, and haunting.
But as other reporters were captivated by the
secrecy of these rituals,
one writer saw them for exactly what they were:
A way for weak men to feel like big boys.
This man was Stetson Kennedy,
a writer who embarked on a personal campaign to
attack the Klan with his weapon of choice: Ink.
Using his typewriter,
Kennedy wrote an endless stream of newspaper and
magazine articles exposing the KKK's bigotry and
false mysticism.
He would correct and critique reporters who used
fantastical language to describe the Klan.
This was a guy who would criticize encyclopedias
that recognized the Ku Klux Klan as a valid political party.
He saw the power in words and would write like
tomorrow won't arrive.
Kennedy would write like he needs it to survive.
Kennedy would write every second he's alive.
Every second he's alive.
Every second he's...
I'm exaggerating a little bit.
But by 1946 with the KKK attempting yet another
publicity stunt and the Adventures of Superman
radio program in full swing,
Stetson Kennedy would play a critical role in
aiding the Man of Steel in his fight against intolerance.
As the Superman radio show was trying to think of
new villains to face now that the standard nazi
wasn't cutting it anymore,
the team had an idea.
What if they could use Superman to tackle social issues?
After the horrors of the holocaust and the rise of the KKK,
perhaps the Man of Steel could teach kids the
value of acceptance and to reject those who
spread hatred and prejudice.
This would also solve the problem of the critics
who condemned the show as they believed it was
teaching children toxic morals.
It was the solution the crew behind
The Adventures of Superman was looking for!
A new path forward to keep the show exciting and relevant.
But with so many potential problems that could go wrong,
they needed a team of talented minds to make sure
this idea wouldn't backfire.
This is my favorite part of the story, guys.
Like a scene from a heist film,
The Adventures of Superman starts assembling
a ragtag team of specialized minds behind the
scenes to make sure they get everything just right.
A big worry was that any story featuring Superman
tackling social issues would come across as
preachy and boring.
But in the hands of Bob Maxwell,
he'd make sure the stories would never lose their sizzle.
He reportedly reviewed and rejected 25 scripts
before the first episode aired.
Maxwell knew that education was important,
but it couldn't overshadow the entertainment.
To help weave in social commentary that was as
accurate as possible,
they brought in former New York Times reporter
Ben Peter Freeman.
He had written for the Adventures of Superman
before and his journalist background would help
to accurately ground the scripts in the reality
of American hate groups.
But factual accuracy was just one issue.
The team was also worried that a child could tune
in for only a minute or two and get the exact wrong idea.
What if they heard an excerpt from a story that
features intolerant characters and didn't stick
around long enough to know that they were the bad guys?
They might think prejudice is not only okay but
endorsed by Superman!
Enter Josette Frank,
a researcher at the Child Study Association of America.
She would bring a psychological understanding of
the minds of children to the table.
Frank was a critic of comic books,
but one who was open-minded and saw them as
literature that could teach values to its readers
if used well.
She also reached out to organizations like the
Big Brothers of America
and the National Conference of Christians and Jews
for feedback on scripts to make sure the show would receive
support from critics.
With the major players in place,
Operation Intolerance was a go!
The Superman team didn't start by immediately
fighting Klansmen, however.
In their first installment called
The Hate Mongers Organization,
they tested the waters by having the Man of Steel
fight terrorists in an organization called
the Guardians of America who were more or less Nazis.
They terrorized the city to stir up hatred within
the community.
Jimmy Olsen attempts to infiltrate the Guardians of America,
but he is found out and nearly killed.
Superman swoops in to save the day and confronts
the gang at their headquarters where he learns
that the leader, Frank Hill,
was actually a former Nazi spy by the of name Franz Hiller.
Superman ends the story with this message.
- [Superman] Remember this as long as you live:
Whenever you met up with anyone who's trying to cause
trouble between people, anyone who tries to tell you
that a man can't be a good American because he's a Catholic,
or a Jew, a Protestant or whatever; you can be pretty sure
he's a rotten American himself.
Not only a rotten American, but a rotten human being.
Don't ever forget that!
- After the 25 episode run of
The Hate Monger's Organization, the ratings
for The Adventures of Superman were through the roof!
It became the number one children's show
and garnered enthusiastic praise from newspapers
and organizations across the country.
Now the team was able to tackle a new threat
dressed in white.
How did they know that their plan would work?
They had a spy on the inside.
Just a couple years prior,
Stetson Kennedy was still fighting the Ku Klux Klan
with his typewriter.
He had moved to Alabama and made connections with
the Anti-Defamation League who set the mild
mannered reporter up with his own secret identity
as a traveling salesman known under the name
John S. Perkins.
As Perkins, he would infiltrate and rise up the ranks of the
Klan to gather intel.
Accounts vary on how exactly the forces of
Stetson Kennedy and Bob Maxwell came together,
but however it happened,
worlds collided in 1946.
As a burning cross lit the revival of the Klan,
as Stetson Kennedy continued to rise through the
ranks and report on his findings
to the Anti-Defamation League and Bob Maxwell's team,
their combined efforts would result in what is
likely the most famous story told on the Superman
radio program: Clan of the Fiery Cross.
You can listen to the entire story right here on YouTube,
link in the description down below,
but here's a brief summary.
A youth baseball team managed by Jimmy Olsen gets
a new pitcher,
a Chinese-American named Tommy Lee.
Tommy talents cause the former pitcher,
Chuck Riggs, to move into more of a backup role,
and Chuck is bitter about it.
He complains about this seemingly harmless
situation to his uncle, Matt Riggs,
who is secretly the leader of a society known as
the Clan of the Fiery Cross.
Matt believes Tommy and his family,
along with the rest of the non-white,
non-Christians in Metropolis are vermin.
- [Tommy] Gosh, who are all these guys, Uncle Matt?
And why are you wearing sheets and hoods?
- [Matt] We're the clan of the fiery cross.
- [Tommy] Clan of the fiery cross?
- [Matt] Right, we're a great secret society
pledged to purify America.
America for 100% Americans only.
One race, one religion, one color.
- [Scott] So yeah, the story escalates pretty quickly.
To drive them out of town,
the Clan of the Fiery Cross does exactly what
you'd expect them to do from their name:
They burn a cross in front of Tommy's home.
When that doesn't scare anyone away,
they attempt to tar and feather Tommy,
but Superman rescues him at the last second.
- [Superman] Wait a minute, what's that caught
between those two rocks?
That's Tommy!
- [Scott] Perry White from the Daily Planet offers a $1000
reward for anyone who can reveal the identities
of those belonging to the Clan.
- [Perry] Now I run a letter of address
to everyone in Metropolis, and offer a $1000 reward
to anyone who can reaveal the identity of a single cowardly
member of that rotten gang of hooded murders.
- [Clark] Oh, that's a swell idea.
- [Perry] That'll smoke those skunks out from behind
their feet, or my name isn't Perry White!
- [Scott] But, surprise surprise,
they burn a cross on his lawn as well.
Not only that, but the robed men capture
both Perry White and Jimmy Olsen.
In an effort to shut down the whole affair,
Chuck Riggs finally comes clean to Superman about
his uncle's involvement in the Clan of the Fiery Cross.
As the Man of Steel confronts the Clan and
rescues Jimmy and Perry,
Matt Riggs escapes and meets with his superior,
named Wilson.
Matt wants to enlist help to from Wilson to hunt
down and kill the people who know his identity
and could testify against him.
That includes murdering Tommy, Perry, Jimmy,
even his own nephew Chuck.
But to Matt's shock,
Wilson explains that they're not going to kill anyone.
In fact, this whole thing has gotten wildly out of hand.
Matt doesn't understand that to Wilson,
the Clan of the Fiery Cross is nothing more than a business.
- [Wilson] Your fool stunt costs us 10,000 new members
who would've paid us $100 a piece for initiation fees,
and another $25 for robes and hoods.
That means over $1 million we'd have split!
- [Matt] So what?
What's money got to do with the spot we're in now!?
- [Wilson] What's money got to do with it?
- [Matt] Yes, after all we're not in this only for money.
No?
- [Wilson] Is it possible that you really believe
all that stuff about getting rid of the foreigners?
That one race, one religion, one color hokum?
- [Matt] Hokum!?
Why it's the absolute truth!
We've got to save America from foreign elements.
- [Wilson] I thought you had brains, Riggs.
But obviously something's happened to you.
You've become drunk on that slop we put up for the suckers.
- [Matt] Suckers!?
Who are you calling--
- [Wilson] Our members, Riggs.
The poor fish who want to hate and blame somebody
else for their failures in life.
The little nobodies who want to believe some of the race
is inferior so they can feel superior!
- [Matt] Why who asked you?
All of sudden you talk like a dirty foreigner yourself!
- [Wilson] I'm running a business Riggs, and so are you.
We deal in one of the oldest and most profitable
commodities on earth: hate.
Your mistake was when you forget you were a business man
and began believing your own sales talk!
- [Scott] With his world shaken,
Matt Riggs snaps and strangles Wilson to death.
In one last desperate move,
Matt attempts to kill Jimmy, Perry,
and Chuck together as they all attend the
championship baseball game.
Matt sets up on a rooftop overlooking the game.
He aims down his rifle and pulls the trigger,
but Superman zooms in deflects the bullets and
captures the bigot Matt Riggs for good.
- [Superman] Oh no you won't Riggs.
I'll take that rifle!
- [Riggs] Superman!
- [Scott] And just like that,
Jimmy Olsen's baseball team wins the championship game!
Oh, and the Clan of the Fiery Cross has been defeated.
But that baseball game, though!
Despite what you may have gathered from my retelling,
the story was incredibly well-written,
well-acted, and well-received.
Bob Maxwell and his brilliant team pulled off the
impossible yet again.
They told a story with a valuable message without
sacrificing any of the thrills listeners had come
to love about the Man of Steel.
Countless newspapers and organizations showered
the Superman story with praise.
Actor Bud Collyer who portrayed Superman
had previously hidden his identity from the public.
And finally revealed his name, promising that
the Man of Steel's campaign of racial and
religious tolerance could continue.
As the story of Superman vs. the Ku Klux Klan
became a legend that would be
retold again and again for over 50 years,
details slid into the tale that misreport
Stetson Kennedy's contributions.
That's largely due to Kennedy himself is
the one who wrote the most about it.
It's important to remember that Stetson Kennedy
was a writer and a folklorist.
He knew how to use those skills to strip
the mysticism away from the Ku Klux Klan and
instead expose them as worthy of nothing more
than ridicule.
But that also occasionally meant spinning a tale
that was engaging, sure, but occasionally self-serving.
So yeah, the myth you may have heard about
the Superman radio show revealing Klan codewords
to the public is not true,
But the Clan of the Fiery Cross helped to open the public's
eyes to the evils of the Ku Klux Klan.
A few years passed,
and the already dwindling membership of the KKK
was left in shambles.
It would be easy for us to give The Adventures of Superman
all the credit here.
It certainly makes an entertaining story that's
been shared across the internet many times,
including in this YouTube video, and of course,
as someone who runs a YouTube channel about superheroes,
I would love to leave the story as it is say that
the Man of Steel brought down the KKK.
But the reality is messier and richer.
The real heroes were federal and state prosecutors,
relentless journalists,
and groups like the Anti-Defamation League who
all worked to stifle the Klan.
Superman's role aimed to educate the country
about deep-seated racism and to expose the KKK as
a group of hate mongers.
But is it really surprising that Superman would
be the poster boy for tolerance and acceptance of
one another?
As author Rick Bowers brilliantly writes in his
book Superman Versus the KKK on which this entire
video is based,
when the Man of Steel premiered,
he, quote, "offered a little bit to everyone.
"Coming from a distant planet,
"he was the ultimate foreigner.
"Raised in the midwestern heartland,
"he was the quintessential American.
"Growing up in a small town,
"he was rural at heart.
"But moving to a big city,
"he became more sophisticated and worldly.
"He was both weak and strong.
"His meek, mild alter ego, Clark Kent,
"was a sheepish bumbler,
"but he was always ready to transform himself into
"the all-powerful superhero," end quote.
Hey, looks like we ran out of greenscreen budget.
Any as I mentioned, the bulk of this info
comes from the book
"Superman Versus the Ku Klux Klan" by Rick Bowers.
There's significantly more context and more
details in the book.
I highly encourage you to check it out if you
want to know more.
Link in the description down below.
Thank you guys so much for watching.
Normally I'd ask you to subscribe,
but sometimes YouTube doesn't deliver videos to you all,
so I want to plug our Twitter instead.
You can follow @NerdSync and @ScottNiswander,
that's my personal one, for updates on new videos
and an obnoxious amount of quote tweets.
In the meantime,
check out some more of our videos that YouTube's
computer brain guarantees you'll love.
While you look those over,
I want to thank our patrons, especially Christoffer Lange,
Keaten Lampert, Mike Harvil, Kenda, Elizabeth Montsell,
and the rest of the wonderful nerds who support us
over at patreon.com/nerdsync.
My name is Scott, reminding you to read between the panels
and grow smarter through comics.
See ya!